US astronaut Neil Armstrong, who took a giant leap for mankind when he became
the first person to walk on the moon, has died at the age of 82 on 25 August.
Armstrong died following complications from heart-bypass surgery he underwent
earlier this august month.
As commander of the Apollo 11 mission, Armstrong became the first human to set
foot on the moon on July 20, 1969. As he stepped on the dusty surface, Armstrong
said, "That's one small step for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind.
Those words endure as one of the best known quotes in the English language.
Some controversy still surrounds his famous quote. The broadcast did not have
the "a" in "one small step for a man ... " He and Nasa insisted static had
obscured the "a," but after repeated playbacks, he admitted he may have dropped
the letter.
Attempts have been made using modern acoustic equipment to search for the
missing letter, with one Australian scientist claiming to have found it.
Armstrong has expressed a preference, however, that written quotations include
the "a" in parentheses.
The Apollo 11 astronauts' euphoric moonwalk provided Americans with a sense of
achievement in the space race with Cold War foe the Soviet Union and while
Washington was engaged in a bloody war with the communists in Vietnam.
Neil Alden Armstrong was 38 years old at the time and even though he had
fulfilled one of mankind's age-old quests that placed him at the pinnacle of
human achievement, he did not revel in his accomplishment. He even seemed
frustrated by the acclaim it brought.
"I guess we all like to be recognized not for one piece of fireworks but for the
ledger of our daily work," Armstrong said in an interview on CBS's "60 Minutes"
program in 2005.
He once was asked how he felt knowing his footprints would likely stay on the
moon's surface for thousands of years. "I kind of hope that somebody goes up
there one of these days and cleans them up," he said.
Born Aug. 5, 1930, in Wapakoneta, Ohio, Armstrong was the first of three
children of Stephen and Viola Armstrong. He married his college sweetheart,
Janet Shearon, in 1956. They were divorced in 1994, when he married Carol
Knight.
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